Navy unveils laser weapon for ships

Weapon tested in San Diego over summer

The Laser Weapon System (LaWS) temporarily installed aboard the guided-missile destroyer USS Dewey (DDG 105) in San Diego, Calif., is a technology demonstrator built by the Naval Sea Systems Command from commercial fiber solid state lasers, utilizing combination methods developed at the Naval Research Laboratory. LaWS can be directed onto targets from the radar track obtained from a MK 15 Phalanx Close-In Weapon system or other targeting source. The Office of Naval Research's Solid State Laser (SSL) portfolio includes LaWS development and upgrades providing a quick reaction capability for the fleet with an affordable SSL weapon prototype. This capability provides Navy ships a method for Sailors to easily defeat small boat threats and aerial targets without using bullets.
— U.S. Navy

The Laser Weapon System (LaWS) temporarily installed aboard the guided-missile destroyer USS Dewey (DDG 105) in San Diego, Calif., is a technology demonstrator built by the Naval Sea Systems Command from commercial fiber solid state lasers, utilizing combination methods developed at the Naval Research Laboratory. LaWS can be directed onto targets from the radar track obtained from a MK 15 Phalanx Close-In Weapon system or other targeting source. The Office of Naval Research's Solid State Laser (SSL) portfolio includes LaWS development and upgrades providing a quick reaction capability for the fleet with an affordable SSL weapon prototype. This capability provides Navy ships a method for Sailors to easily defeat small boat threats and aerial targets without using bullets.
/ U.S. Navy

Saying that the future is here, and will be affordable in austere times, the Navy on Monday unveiled a laser weapon mounted on a ship.

The laser was quietly tested last year on the San Diego-based destroyer Dewey. According to a Navy video, the laser knocked down an aerial drone, sending it into the sea in flames.

One Navy official said that the entrance of lasers in naval warfare is akin to the arrival of guns at a knife fight.

Now, the Navy will deploy the solid-state laser about the floating platform Ponce in fiscal year 2014, two years ahead of schedule.

"This capability provides a tremendously affordable answer to the costly problem of defending against asymmetric threats, and that kind of innovative approach is crucial in a fiscally constrained environment," Chief of Naval Research Rear Adm. Matthew Klunder said in a news release.

The technology gives sailors new options, including the ability to control a laser weapon's output. That would allow everything from non-lethal disabling all the way to total destruction.

"We expect that in the future, a missile will not be able to simply outmaneuver a highly accurate, high-energy laser beam traveling at the speed of light," Klunder said.

Following the Ponce demonstration, the Navy and Defense Department will continue to research ways to integrate affordable laser weapons into the fleet, officials said.